Our Team
William A. “Bill” Ghormley
Born: Oakland, California January 30, 1949
Raised on the Pala Ranch Dairy, San Diego County, CA
Academic:
Graduated Fallbrook High School, 1967
Graduated Stanford University, 1971, BA Economics, History, Languages, Attended Stanford in Italy, 1969
Graduate Studies — Boston College — European History
Graduate Studies — Tuck Executive Program/Dartmouth College — completed 1987 — International Strategy
Work:
General Foods Maxwell House Coffee 1971-1974
Kendall Health Care/Colgate Palmolive, Hospital Products for Infection Control 1974-1982
Polaroid Director of Medical & Industrial Imaging Technologies 1982-1986
Polaroid Original Equipment Manufacturers Worldwide Managing Director 1986 - 1999
Marketing Science Institute, CEO, 1999-2000 Harvard Business School/Wharton Business School founders
Forum/Pearson Plc Leadership Development 2000-2003 “Customer Branded Experience” Practice
“Snap Out of It!” Consulting for Turnarounds 2003-2007
SVP, Business Development “Xconomy” Tech news and conferences re Tech-Cluster Development 2007-2018
Historical Interpreter — 2017 - present — Conner Prairie History Museum, Indiana Historical Society, Smithsonian
Bill spent his life embroiled in the sciences and across cultures, in one way or another. He was raised on a Carnation dairy, working for his family to realize his grandfather Alfred Ghormley’s dream of operating “the perfect dairy” — in their case with 360 “contented” Holsteins in Bonsall, California.
The workers on the ranch were Mexican-Americans and Portuguese-Americans, from whom Bill received “language training” second to none. This combined well with his interests breeding fine cattle, growing fine crops, and producing high quality milk, and working with motivated people.
Later in his life, Bill studied physics and chemistry, Latin, and history — all with passion. He worked in the coffee industry and in hospitals, then was recruited by Dr. Edwin Land to help develop, market, and propagate imaging applications, working with a wide range of partners in the life sciences, research and development, and manufacturing worlds — deploying Polaroid’s technologies around the world — especially in Japan, Germany, Britain, Holland, Italy, Canada, Mexico, and the United States. This led Bill to the reengineering of Polaroid’s corporate processes, where he led a task force to improve the performance of its chemical and electronic imaging offerings. He ended his time at Polaroid leading New Business development — focusing on the future of electronic imaging and its emerging applications.
Bill left Polaroid to run the Marketing Science Institute, founded by Harvard and Wharton business schools, to explore the application of scientific principles to advertising, marketing, and business management. He then was called to Pearson Plc’s Forum Corporation, where he was a leader in their “Branded Customer Experience” Practice. He joined the founding team of Xconomy in 2007, tracking tech cluster evolution, and dedicated himself to building the organization’s relationships with sponsors and investors until it was sold to the UK’s Informa in 2018.
Bill has worked in academia for many years — as a student, a researcher,
an assistant professor, a section leader, and a case study instructor.
He has worked from the elementary school level through graduate school,
working with students to discover history, strategy, and technology development.
He has also led online international classes in business strategy — primarily
at Northeastern University — across 10 time zones to hundreds of students.
He taught at Boston University and University of Massachusetts,
among many others. He helped build an internal “university” with a major
client that offered 28 courses in a Leaning Management System, as they
sought to evolve their corporate culture.
He now works at Conner Prairie Historical Museum as a historical interpreter, focused on four streams of activity:
Indigenous American History — especially the Lenape/Delaware and related tribes
American African History — especially those enslaved in the 18th-19th century
The Exploration and Cultural Integration of European peoples, formation of the American Culture — especially during the 1800’s
The American War of Secession (aka Civil War) and its causes, impacts, derivations today
